For years I lived right by the sea. I had plenty of alcohol and medications. the prevailing currents would’ve swept my body across the border into a hostile country, where no one who found it would’ve cared. I don’t live to spare anyone else’s feelings, not least those who would mourn me as dead for living the life I want to live. I live because I deserve it, I deserve my family’s respect and care while we’re both here, and I don’t need anyone else’s shame.
To live on solely for obligation and guilt isn’t living at all, and anyone who wishes that on someone else just so they can remain a half-dead trophy they can congratulate themselves for “saving” can eat shit. If you’re reading this and you need to hear something, keep going. Keep trying. We live in an insane world; sometimes you have to try the same thing over and over so you can get different results. Live another day and see what happens. Not for anyone else, but because it’s a shame to miss out on this wild a ride.
This post honestly just pisses me off. Your life is worth living. Not your parents’ child’s life. Yours.
I survived suicide. As a side effect, the action showed me who my real friends were. People started to finally pay the fuck attention to me and my struggles.
Turns out I had a rare physical disease that was making it very difficult to participate in society not just as dude, but as a whole.
As many have said, don’t do it, I still have stomach issues from the wombo combo of meds I took to do the deed. I was lucky.
If you ever feel like no one loves ya or that your are nothing. Just poof for a week to somewhere they can’t reach you and where you are safe. Don’t hurt yourself. Check to see how many reach out to you. If the number is low or zero, instead of saying: “see, no one loves me.” Go “damn, these fucks don’t give a damn about me, let’s find someone who will!”
It’s insane, but: you don’t die, you learn who loves you, and you have your health.
Go forth and fight the demons. As long as you are fighting them others will assit.
That is certainly some experience, and a good life lesson. I just want to remark, if my best friends disappeared for a week, I would assume they just wanted to disappear for a week, and had their reasons to not tell me. Doesn’t mean I don’t care about them.
So? That’s their problem. There are people who’d dance on my grave if I died tomorrow, too, and what they think has just as little bearing on my decision to keep living. Categorically irrelevant. You can’t show someone the beauty and joy of living by dragging them through shame. Worse still, pegging your self-worth to others’ suffering creates an implicit threshold, a thought stuck in the back of your mind: “What if the suffering I cause now is more than the momentary pain I’d cause by stopping?”
It feels good to tell people things like this. It’s one of the most awful things to hear.
I think they may have meant that you don’t get to decide on how other victims of depression feel about suicide. Nobody else shares your life, experiences, and values so iyou shouldn’t assert what they should do with their lives.
If that’s the case they were trying to make, then they didn’t do the best job explaining themselves. Or I could have completely misunderstood their comment
so if it’s their problem why are you resenting them for not sharing in your views? why do you feel compelled to pass judgement on them for not sharing your philosophy and feelings on life?
I think this is less about guilting the victim and more about reminding them that people care about them. The assumption is that those who take their own lives feel like no one cares for/loves them.
Unfortunately, this take often reads like conservative pundits that only “care” about fetuses until they’re born, at which point they’re considered a drain on society.
A lot of the quotes people repeat when trying to help someone ends up backfiring. You can’t just repeat plattitudes. People suffering from mental illness aren’t stupid or deaf, they’ve already heard the lines before. Mimicry doesn’t help.
The only generalized thing I can recommend people to say when trying to help someone with mental issues is to just ask: “What do you need?”. If they need space, give it. If they need to talk, listen. If they need something else, be honest about whether that’s in your ability to help with.
Another important thing to note is to not view them as something that needs to be fixed. And you need to be very honest with yourself about that. Most people will try to “help” because it makes them feel better, not the person they’re trying to help.
there is a difference between someone caring for me as a feeling, and doing it as an activity.
like yes, my parents cared about me, emotionally. but their actions, were hardly ever caring.
and people don’t seem to understand the difference. i have had the same thing in romantic relationships. someone saying they care about you is very different than them actually doing this that show that they care, and sometimes, their feelings of care, lead them to engage in activities that are abusive and make the other person feel like absolute shit about themselves and the relationship.
have you ever been in a relationship with someone who claims to love you, and just systematically does things that show you they don’t love you, or does those things under the guises of love, but is actively harming you?
because that’s what physical/emotional abusers do. they see their abuse of you as them loving/caring for you. or ‘just trying to help’.
i think my favorite example was LTR i was in once, where i had a girlfriend who showed she cared about my studying for cert exames, by buying me pencils… cute. but then she systematically got enraged that i was spending so much time studying and not spending it with her, and that she engaged in active sabotage of me emotionally so that i’d fail the exams. but she ‘was loving and supportive’ by buying me… pencils… least to say i was never able to articulate the problem to her of her actions. She basically just told me I was a awful jerk for ‘neglecting her’ by needing a couple of nights off to study… she was co-dependent and saw those 5-6 hours of me investing in my (and our) future… as ‘theft’ from her need to be with me everyday. i only broke up with her because shortly thereafter she physically assaulted me, again under the guise of ‘correcting’ my ‘abuse’ of her, which she alleged was because I was not ‘doing enough’ to impress her parents…
For years I lived right by the sea. I had plenty of alcohol and medications. the prevailing currents would’ve swept my body across the border into a hostile country, where no one who found it would’ve cared. I don’t live to spare anyone else’s feelings, not least those who would mourn me as dead for living the life I want to live. I live because I deserve it, I deserve my family’s respect and care while we’re both here, and I don’t need anyone else’s shame.
To live on solely for obligation and guilt isn’t living at all, and anyone who wishes that on someone else just so they can remain a half-dead trophy they can congratulate themselves for “saving” can eat shit. If you’re reading this and you need to hear something, keep going. Keep trying. We live in an insane world; sometimes you have to try the same thing over and over so you can get different results. Live another day and see what happens. Not for anyone else, but because it’s a shame to miss out on this wild a ride.
This post honestly just pisses me off. Your life is worth living. Not your parents’ child’s life. Yours.
I survived suicide. As a side effect, the action showed me who my real friends were. People started to finally pay the fuck attention to me and my struggles. Turns out I had a rare physical disease that was making it very difficult to participate in society not just as dude, but as a whole. As many have said, don’t do it, I still have stomach issues from the wombo combo of meds I took to do the deed. I was lucky. If you ever feel like no one loves ya or that your are nothing. Just poof for a week to somewhere they can’t reach you and where you are safe. Don’t hurt yourself. Check to see how many reach out to you. If the number is low or zero, instead of saying: “see, no one loves me.” Go “damn, these fucks don’t give a damn about me, let’s find someone who will!”
It’s insane, but: you don’t die, you learn who loves you, and you have your health.
Go forth and fight the demons. As long as you are fighting them others will assit.
That is certainly some experience, and a good life lesson. I just want to remark, if my best friends disappeared for a week, I would assume they just wanted to disappear for a week, and had their reasons to not tell me. Doesn’t mean I don’t care about them.
you don’t get to decide that for other people. they do.
we have no control over other people, especially not their inner emotional lives.
So? That’s their problem. There are people who’d dance on my grave if I died tomorrow, too, and what they think has just as little bearing on my decision to keep living. Categorically irrelevant. You can’t show someone the beauty and joy of living by dragging them through shame. Worse still, pegging your self-worth to others’ suffering creates an implicit threshold, a thought stuck in the back of your mind: “What if the suffering I cause now is more than the momentary pain I’d cause by stopping?”
It feels good to tell people things like this. It’s one of the most awful things to hear.
I think they may have meant that you don’t get to decide on how other victims of depression feel about suicide. Nobody else shares your life, experiences, and values so iyou shouldn’t assert what they should do with their lives.
If that’s the case they were trying to make, then they didn’t do the best job explaining themselves. Or I could have completely misunderstood their comment
so if it’s their problem why are you resenting them for not sharing in your views? why do you feel compelled to pass judgement on them for not sharing your philosophy and feelings on life?
I’m sorry, I’m not sure I understand. Who are “they,” and what is “that” in your initial reply?
I think this is less about guilting the victim and more about reminding them that people care about them. The assumption is that those who take their own lives feel like no one cares for/loves them.
Unfortunately, this take often reads like conservative pundits that only “care” about fetuses until they’re born, at which point they’re considered a drain on society.
A lot of the quotes people repeat when trying to help someone ends up backfiring. You can’t just repeat plattitudes. People suffering from mental illness aren’t stupid or deaf, they’ve already heard the lines before. Mimicry doesn’t help.
The only generalized thing I can recommend people to say when trying to help someone with mental issues is to just ask: “What do you need?”. If they need space, give it. If they need to talk, listen. If they need something else, be honest about whether that’s in your ability to help with.
Another important thing to note is to not view them as something that needs to be fixed. And you need to be very honest with yourself about that. Most people will try to “help” because it makes them feel better, not the person they’re trying to help.
everyone cares about when you’re dead
because at that point you are nothing but a memory and you can’t ever upset or burden or annoy them. they can just idealize you.
there is a difference between someone caring for me as a feeling, and doing it as an activity.
like yes, my parents cared about me, emotionally. but their actions, were hardly ever caring.
and people don’t seem to understand the difference. i have had the same thing in romantic relationships. someone saying they care about you is very different than them actually doing this that show that they care, and sometimes, their feelings of care, lead them to engage in activities that are abusive and make the other person feel like absolute shit about themselves and the relationship.
have you ever been in a relationship with someone who claims to love you, and just systematically does things that show you they don’t love you, or does those things under the guises of love, but is actively harming you?
because that’s what physical/emotional abusers do. they see their abuse of you as them loving/caring for you. or ‘just trying to help’.
i think my favorite example was LTR i was in once, where i had a girlfriend who showed she cared about my studying for cert exames, by buying me pencils… cute. but then she systematically got enraged that i was spending so much time studying and not spending it with her, and that she engaged in active sabotage of me emotionally so that i’d fail the exams. but she ‘was loving and supportive’ by buying me… pencils… least to say i was never able to articulate the problem to her of her actions. She basically just told me I was a awful jerk for ‘neglecting her’ by needing a couple of nights off to study… she was co-dependent and saw those 5-6 hours of me investing in my (and our) future… as ‘theft’ from her need to be with me everyday. i only broke up with her because shortly thereafter she physically assaulted me, again under the guise of ‘correcting’ my ‘abuse’ of her, which she alleged was because I was not ‘doing enough’ to impress her parents…